Updated 11:38 pm, Monday, December 9, 2013

NEW BRITAIN -- A weeklong "Acts of Kindness" program was launched Monday with many suggestions for people throughout the state to help their communities while remembering the lives lost in the Newtown school shootings.

Coat and clothing drives, soup kitchens and assisted-living centers are all possible focuses for kindness and aid. More ideas are available at local United Way offices throughout the state.

"Newtown has to be a movement for the future, not just looking backward," said U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., during a morning news conference at the YWCA. "Each act of kindness has a value and a power beyond the individuals involved. That's the `Connecticut effect.' "

He called for state residents to act toward "changing the world for the better."

Frank said U.S. Rep. Elizabeth Esty, D-Conn., and Blumenthal have spent a great deal of time in Newtown, helping to lead the community out of "its darkest time."

Frank said Newtown will prove its strength by refusing to let the murders define it.

"While we can't bring back our 20 children and six educators from Newtown, or the more than 30,000 other victims of gun violence over the past year alone, and we certainly can't fathom the pain that all of these families, we can honor them through action," he said.

Blumenthal and Frank were joined by Esty, members of the Newtown Foundation, state United Way President Richard Porth and Tyrek Marquez, a young survivor of a Hartford shooting. On Wednesday, families from around the country, including Marquez and others from Connecticut, will rally in Washington, D.C.

"I can't erase the pain -- and I wish I could -- of what we felt in the firehouse that day," Esty recalled of the morning of the murders last Dec. 14. "The pain that those families and that that community has to live with is beyond our ability to imagine. But the pain is shared by countless others around the country."

The week of giving started off with a reading for children at the YWCA. Visit www.volunteerct.org for more information about how to offer help.